Finding the Echoes
by Sky Blue Hunter's Soul
Summary: An odd sound prompts a seasoned hunter to go out of her way, and what she finds changes everything she ever thought about men and monsters.


**Finding the Echoes**

It wasn't much more than a typical day for the roaming huntress and the two loyal Felynes following her every step. The Mountain Stream seemed calm in the early morning, though the air was thin at this altitude yet heavy with unshed rain. If the weather disgruntled the huntress, the only hint she showed was the slight panting as she slogged through a tiny tributary. The male Felyne- the one keeping himself a few steps before the second- was a Deep Blue, though the lingering humidity had made him darker and sweat drip from his whiskers. The second Felyne- this one just plain, soft Blue- trailed more sedately, the hammer slung over her back weighing her down. The woman sighed, coming to a stop and shaking her head.  
"Rainy season is fast approaching, isn't it?" She mused, glancing up at the thick cloud cover.  
The male Felyne gave a noncommittal grunt. "I don't think we need to be worried about that."  
The huntress shrugged. "The worst the rains can do is make the sea voyage back to Minegarde a little rough. I just wonder how the ecosystem changes in the rainy season."  
The Deep Blue cat snorted. "Leave the pondering to your husband. We came here for something, Mistress, remember that."  
She laughed. "Dinner. I know, I know, Marco. You have to let me indulge a _little_."  
Marco huffed. "If I recall correctly, Mistress, I've 'indulged' you since childhood."  
The female Lynian sighed and shook her head, smiling. Always, the huntress and her mate had been this close. If she was honest, she was somewhat jealous of their close relationship, but then the huntress had bought the Deep Blue Felyne at the start of her career and they'd fought the odds together long before the Blue cat ever came into the picture.  
"Hey hey hey, when we met I was a teenager, you can give me that at least-"  
Marco snorted. "Fine, you were a child in nothing but experience."  
The huntress started to retort but a small paw on her leg forestalled the argument from finishing. The woman blinked down at her secondary Felyne.  
"Laurie..?"  
Laurie smiled. "Madam Raelinae, shouldn't we just find our Gagua and head back to Yukumo? We need to begin cooking before it gets too late."  
Rae winced. "Right... Yeah, of course."  
The huntress unhooked her Lance- the Spear of Prominence- from its back holster, twisting the grip as she brought it to bear to eject the heated blade.  
"Three Gagua, you two. No more, no less."  
The cats nodded sharply and bounded away into the underbrush after their new quarry.

Five minutes later found the huntress dragging a pair of deceased Gagua after her by the rope tied about their legs. Her Comrades carried their own bird. Marco cast eager looks at the carcass, blue eyes deciding on the best place to cut to get his portion. Laurie chided him for his greed but before the Deep Blue Felyne could relent, Laurie's eyes widened at their master.  
"Madam?" She ventured.  
Raelinae had slipped into a deathly quiet stance, scanning the area. It was her hand tightening on the rope that alerted Marco to exactly how tense she was.  
"Do you hear that?" the woman asked softly.  
Marco cocked his head, twitching his ears about to catch whatever sound his Mistress had, and finally muttered, "The Jaggi?"  
The Lancer nodded. "They're agitated about something."  
"Not agitated," Laurie disagreed. "Excited about something."  
The blue-haired woman frowned and, with a few quick ideas, had their Gagua quarry strung up high in a tree, far out of reach of almost any monster in the Stream in the early morning. Then she gestured to the pair of Felynes with her shield hand, the other ready to unhook the Spear of Prominence at any moment, and they set off after the noise.

They found the source of the Jaggi outcry shortly after entering Area 6. A pack of them clustered eagerly around a deep-set hole in the ground. Two of the orange-and-violet beasts were waist deep in the crevice, and Rae's blood went cold when a high-pitched scream of pain split the air. One of the two Jaggi pulled back from the hole, flinging something glistening red over its shoulder. A waiting Jaggia swallowed it up in one gulp. Marco groaned low in his throat, his own monster instinct telling him exactly what was happening in that cave, and glanced to his mistress; though he knew she'd already be gone.  
Raelinae drew her Lance and charged without thinking any further. One cry from the beleaguered creatures in that den and her ire was raised. With a harsh shout the Spear of Prominence found its mark in the side if one of the digging Jaggi. Flames erupted from the tip of the blade, making the juvenile Bird Wyvern howl in agony before a thrust ended its life. The small body went cartwheeling through the air, bouncing to a stop some fifteen feet away. The rest of the Jaggi pack squawked in terror, but it didn't take too long for her to rend three more of the monsters to ribbons. The remnants of the group scattered in all directions. Rae growled at them as they ran, clearly furious at having the rest of her prey taken away, but soon enough remembered that she had chased them off for a reason.

She hooked up her Lance and fell to her knees next to the den. Marco hissed a warning, but she ignored him. The Lancer brazenly reached her hand into the hole. After a second of rooting around she pulled back with a handful of red, stringy pulp. With a grimace, she handed it off to Laurie, who whimpered as she took the bundle of meat and fur.  
"Bury it," Rae murmured softly, already reaching for more. Laurie nodded, fighting back tears as she carefully cradled the lost beast. The Felyne mother could tell that whatever it had been, it had been young. It didn't deserve such a death. Marco sighed at the look on his mate's face, but his mistress worried him more. Raelinae was elbow-deep in the hole, groping blindly for anything else alive.  
"Marco," she called, "Take this. It's a live one."  
The cat's hackles rose. Whatever that beast was she was going to hand him, he didn't much want anything to do with it. But love for his mistress had him holding out his paws for the monster she deposited in his grip.  
He stared at the wiggling thing as it howled pitifully. Some sort of canine monster, that much was obvious. But not anything related to Jinouga; the colors were completely wrong. This thing was white, with two nubby tusks protruding from the center of its upper jaw and a blonde ridge of fur running down its spine to culminate in a wild tuft of red-streaked-yellow. Marco blinked at it, turning it around cautiously to examine it. Certainly nothing he'd ever seen before. Rae tilted her head back to look at the pup and judging by her surprised lifted eyebrow, she hadn't seen it before either.  
Rae went after more while Marco juggled the wriggling newborn. Laurie came back, her paws washed clean, and was the next to receive a squirming tuft of fur. This one was a darker shade, a deep metallic grey. The red in its back ridge was brighter and more prevalent and its tiny tusks were a bit longer than its sibling's.  
"Is that it?" Marco asked hesitantly, hoping the den was empty and that they wouldn't have any more unhappy pups.  
But Rae was still searching. With a sudden sharp cry she flinched, but her arm remained steady, and within a couple of seconds she had pulled out a third. This one was a much deeper color, almost pure black. Laurie hissed at the sight of this one- clearly its left back leg had been badly mangled in the attack- but it had apparently been feeling healthy enough to bite the hand of its savior. The huntress was grinning tightly, the little beast's teeth clamped around her middle finger. It was growling, obviously unwilling to let go, but both the Felynes took it as a good sign that it had so much vitality left.  
"Let's head back home."  
"I agree," Laurie murmured, gazing at the small bundle in her arms. The Lancer nodded, but after a second's pause, Rae reached into her pack and sent off her aid flare, startling both her Comrades. She never set those off, even when she did need help.  
"What are you doing?" Marco asked.  
She shrugged. "Maybe Epoch knows what these things are, and I need to know before I try to start taking care of some orphaned baby monsters."

Laurie took a seat on a small rock, petting the small creature stumbling around at her paws. Raelinae had taken an interest in the only white one and had swapped the injured one for Marco's. Though that displeased the Felyne, the wounded pup more or less just wanted to sleep. The woman was smiling, scratching up and down the little beast's spine. Underneath the ridge of fur was apparently sensitive, because the young monster would release a queer squealing growl, really more a purr. Rae had laughed and kept petting the pup, scratching its fur regularly until the thing's voice seemed confused.

A full six minutes later Epoch arrived, leaping out of one of the branching ancient Yukumo trees. The Guild Guardsman was tall and lean as ever, but his expression wasn't his usual easy smirk. His face was drawn tight, a wariness about him he didn't normally possess. He relaxed when he saw Rae standing there, whole and uninjured, but then his expression shifted to one of complete befuddlement.  
"If you're all right," he muttered, pointing at her, "then why am I here?" He queried suspiciously.  
"These," the huntress replied succinctly. She thrust the pup in her hands toward the Guardsman. "What are they?"  
Epoch's jaw dropped. "Th-that's a- no. No way. Where did you- where did you even-?"  
She jerked her head to the left. "That destroyed den over there. In the embankment. There was originally perhaps so much as five, but all that's left now is what you see here."  
"What are they?" Marco asked, irritation starting to creep back into his features. The black pup was becoming restless again.  
"Orugaron pups," a raspy voice advised, coming out of the trees. Both woman and Felynes tilted their heads to regard the newcomer- a gnarled old Felyne in a Guild Aid outfit, a pipe hanging out of her mouth.  
"Fellna," Rae greeted. "And Tecer," she added with an ill-hidden chuckle when Epoch's second Felyne came blundering through the underbrush pulling the rescue cart.  
Fellna regarded her student's hasty progress with a grave frown. Her attention switched back to the huntress when Rae asked "What in Minegarde is an Orugaron?"  
Though Fellna started to answer, Epoch snapped over her, "They're supposed to be exclusive to the far eastern regions of the world. Which is why I want to know how they got here. There should be no way for a pair of Echo Wolves to be here."  
"Echo Wolves?"  
Epoch glared sidelong at his assigned hunter. "Orugaron- Echo Wolf. Specifically, Kamu- 'black'- and Nono- 'white'- Orugaron. Kamu Orugaron are always male and Nono are always female. They travel together in mated pairs, and even fight together. It's rare for them to ever separate."  
Rae blinked, looking down at her squirming bundle of puppy. "So this one is female then."  
Laurie held up her oddly grey pup. "What about this one then?" She questioned. Fellna hobbled up and yanked on the pup's tail. It squawked and struggled against the invasion, but Fellna dropped it soon enough.  
"Male," she acknowledged.  
Rae set her hands on her hips and shifted her weight, fixing her Guardsman with a suspicious look. "So would Orugarons normally leave a litter like this?"  
Epoch shook his head. "No. That's highly unusual. The Echo Wolves are extremely devoted to family, and even more so to raising their pups. To leave them like this is very strange."  
"Master! Over here!"  
Epoch's pale blonde ponytail fell off his shoulder at Fellna's call. The older Felyne was crouched by the river, pipe pointing at something in the mud. Guardsman and Lancer hurried over, Rae struggling to balance the unhappy young Nono in her arms.  
"What is it, Fellna?"  
"Here," the cat muttered, gesturing again with her pipe. "See the tracks? The parents were here, likely while it was happening."  
Laurie gasped. "And they didn't do anything?"  
The old Felyne's grizzled muzzle twitched in distaste at Laurie's quavering question. "Law is different out here, little one." She growled. "Out here you lose a litter, you start worrying about the next one. There can be no sympathy for those already dead."  
Laurie whimpered and shook her head. "But they weren't dead!"  
"The mother doesn't seem to have been very experienced, but her mate is. He's the one who herded her away."  
Looking down at the mismatched tracks, Rae could see how it had played out. The parents had heard their offspring's distress and had come back. They'd seen the Jaggi pack, perhaps with their leader, razing their den and killing their young. The female had tried to get to them, but her older, more world-hardened mate had forced her back and away, leaving the pups to the Jaggi.  
Rae sighed. "Kill or be killed indeed."  
Epoch gave an answering groan. "And now I have to report this to the Guild. A pair of Orugaron running wild in this area is very, very bad. There's no _telling_ what a pair of apex predators like them could do around here. I'll have to put out a capture quest for the pair."  
"And the pups?" Rae asked softly.  
Epoch cast her a thoughtful look. "The parents will not recognize them now. They've given the pups up for dead. They'll either be given up for fostering or killed."  
Violet eyes met with dark blue. Rae smirked. "I'll take them."


End file.
